Today, Mr. Nie had his first car accident in the almost five years he has been driving for us. This is a very good record for the way Chinese drive. Mr. Nie is a very safe driver. Most companies do NOT allow their Western employees to drive – for a reason. Driving is a forward approach. Therefore, making a u-turn in the middle of the street with an oncoming car is common practice. The oncoming car will wait until the u-turning car is out of the way. Mr. Nie does this often as he would not allow us to cross the street. Always looking out for our safety, he u-turns to put us on the right side of the street. This is actually very nice and some of my friends have comment their driver drops them on the wrong side of the street all the time. Crossing the street is dangerous in Shanghai!

Mr Nie was pulling out onto a one-way busy street. He hit a man on a motocycle in the bike lane coming from the other direction. In typical China fashion, the police were called. Mr. Nie left his car in the spot of the accident. When the police arrived, there was much conversation before it was all decided. I had no idea.

When Jim got home, he told me the story he got from Mr. Nie. Mr. Nie had to pay the motorcycle man 100rmb ($15). The motorcycle was driving the wrong way in the bike lane, therefore, was at fault. The 100rmb was decided because the man had no money. My first reactions was REALLY! The important part of this story is traffic in the bike lane was going both directions the entire 40 minutes we sat there. I had no idea it was a “one-way” bike lane. This is a very large road with 8 lanes of traffic. The lanes are divided into four different sections with bush barriers in between. In addition, the middles lanes are divided by a large overpass. It would impossible for the motorcycle to be 8 lanes over in the “right” bike lane going with the traffic. I actually felt sorry for the motorcyle man as he has a broken bike with no means to fix it.